Sacrifice

Sacrifice is a word that is becoming less obvious in a culture of instant gratification, text messaging, cell phones, plastic surgeries, and wonder pills. It is my belief that this lack of sacrificial acts has strained our relationship with Christ and the local church in bringing others closer to Him. It is revealed in scripture that our giving should be sacrificial, but this is a struggle for me. I am constantly berated with advertisements of more, more, more. In dealing with sacrifice I came across the following story that shows the sacrifice I would like to live out in my finances.

The Seed Grain
The following article is based on a sermon by missionary Del Tarr who served fourteen years in West Africa with another mission agency. His story points out the price some people pay to sow the seed of the gospel in hard soil.
I was always perplexed by Psalm 126 until I went to the Sahel, that vast stretch of savanna more than four thousand miles wide just under the Sahara Desert. In the Sahel, all the moisture comes in a four month period: May, June, July, and August. After that, not a drop of rain falls for eight months. The ground cracks from dryness, and so do your hands and feet. The winds of the Sahara pick up the dust and throw it thousands of feet into the air. It then comes slowly drifting across West Africa as a fine grit. It gets inside your mouth. It gets inside your watch and stops it. The year’s food, of course, must all be grown in those four months. People grow sorghum or milo in small fields.
October and November...these are beautiful months. The granaries are full—the harvest has come. People sing and dance. They eat two meals a day. The sorghum is ground between two stones to make flour and then a mush with the consistency of yesterday’s Cream of Wheat. The sticky mush is eaten hot; they roll it into little balls between their fingers, drop it into a bit of sauce and then pop it into their mouths. The meal lies heavy on their stomachs so they can sleep.
December comes, and the granaries start to recede. Many families omit the morning meal. Certainly by January not one family in fifty is still eating two meals a day.
By February, the evening meal diminishes. The meal shrinks even more during March and children succumb to sickness. You don’t stay well on half a meal a day.
April is the month that haunts my memory. In it you hear the babies crying in the twilight. Most of the days are passed with only an evening cup of gruel. Then, inevitably, it happens. A six- or seven-year-old boy comes running to his father one day with sudden excitement. “Daddy! Daddy! We’ve got grain!” he shouts. “Son, you know we haven’t had grain for weeks.” “Yes, we have!” the boy insists. “Out in the hut where we keep the goats—there’s a leather sack hanging up on the wall—I reached up and put my hand down in there—Daddy, there’s grain in there! Give it to Mommy so she can make flour, and tonight our tummies can sleep!”
The father stands motionless. “Son, we can’t do that,” he softly explains. “That’s next year’s seed grain. It’s the only thing between us and starvation. We’re waiting for the rains, and then we must use it.”
The rains finally arrive in May, and when they do the young boy watches as his father takes the sack from the wall and does the most unreasonable thing imaginable. Instead of feeding his desperately weakened family, he goes to the field and with tears streaming down his face, he takes the precious seed and throws it away. He scatters it in the dirt! Why? Because he believes in the harvest.
The seed is his; he owns it. He can do anything with it he wants. The act of sowing it hurts so much that he cries. But as the African pastors say when they preach on Psalm 126, “Brother and sisters, this is God’s law of the harvest. Don’t expect to rejoice later on unless you have been willing to sow in tears.” And I want to ask you: How much would it cost you to sow in tears? I don’t mean just giving God something from your abundance, but finding a way to say, “I believe in the harvest, and therefore I will give what makes no sense. The world would call me unreasonable to do this—but I must sow regardless, in order that I may someday celebrate with songs of joy.”

Copyright Leadership, 1983

Do you delay gratification to make it through until you have cash to pay for something or do you use 6 months interest free deals to afford more stuff? I used to be at a place where I thought this was the smart thing to do. Use their money instead of my own was the smart thing to do. Typically, what happened is that I either made a late payment and incurred a significant fee, bought something I really did not need, wasn't quite as excited about the item six months later and dreaded the payments, or paid more than I should have paid for the item. Therefore, I encourage you to sacrifice the short run gratification for the long term satisfaction in your finances. The key is to see how small sacrifices result in the achievement of your long term goals to be debt free, fund college funds, buy a newer car, start your own business, have an emergency fund, retire early, or simply sleep better at night. Once you see the linkage between these small sacrifices and the achievement of your goals, they will become more worthwhile. Everyday I eat lunch at the office instead of going out ($2,000 savings/yr); read the newspaper online instead of subscribing($104/yr.); check out books and videos at the library instead of renting or buying ($500/yr); etc. When we were first married money was so tight that we went without cable tv for 5 years ($3,300 savings). I think it might have been worth it.

I would encourage you to seek those small things that you can cut out of your budget that will help you realize your financial dreams. These could include avoiding the purchase of sodas/snacks out of the vending machine, avoiding your daily latte, giving up soft drinks, or whatever fits your lifestyle. I would encourage you to track your expenditures in a notebook, if you are not doing this already, for a week to see how many ways you can avoid these small item purchases. Doing this will cause you to be more aware of these situations and you will choose to give up things that you can live without. This really adds up if you will be disciplined enough to put these savings towards the achievement of your long-term goals. The harder part is distinguishing between the wants and needs in my life. Do I need cable tv, the newspaper, that specialty coffee, etc.

The scripture for the day comes from the Amplified Bible by the Lockman Foundation.

Ephesians 4

1I THEREFORE, the prisoner for the Lord, appeal to and beg you to walk (lead a life) worthy of the [divine] calling to which you have been called [with behavior that is a credit to the summons to God's service,
2Living as becomes you] with complete lowliness of mind (humility) and meekness (unselfishness, gentleness, mildness), with patience, bearing with one another and making allowances because you love one another.
3Be eager and strive earnestly to guard and keep the harmony and oneness of [and produced by] the Spirit in the binding power of peace.
4[There is] one body and one Spirit--just as there is also one hope [that belongs] to the calling you received--
5[There is] one Lord, one faith, one baptism,
6One God and Father of [us] all, Who is above all [Sovereign over all], pervading all and [living] in [us] all.
7Yet grace (God's unmerited favor) was given to each of us individually [not indiscriminately, but in different ways] in proportion to the measure of Christ's [rich and bounteous] gift.
8Therefore it is said, When He ascended on high, He led captivity captive [He led a train of [a]vanquished foes] and He bestowed gifts on men.(A)
9[But He ascended?] Now what can this, He ascended, mean but that He had previously descended from [the heights of] heaven into [the depths], the lower parts of the earth?
10He Who descended is the [very] same as He Who also has ascended high above all the heavens, that He [His presence] might fill all things (the whole universe, from the lowest to the highest).
11And His gifts were [varied; He Himself appointed and gave men to us] some to be apostles (special messengers), some prophets (inspired preachers and expounders), some evangelists (preachers of the Gospel, traveling missionaries), some pastors (shepherds of His flock) and teachers.

The next post will focus on using your gifts and resources to bless others.